Publication and Product Highlights

Chesapeake Quarterly Magazine

Since the 1980s, a federal-state partnership has labored to restore the nation's largest estuary. In 2017 the Chesapeake Bay Program reached an important milestone in that effort. The program is conducting a "midpoint assessment," a review of the Chesapeake Bay Model, the key tool the program uses to set cleanup goals for the rivers and mainstem of the Bay and to measure progress in achieving them. This issue describes how scientific research has informed the review.

This issue is part of a special in-depth report about the causes of sea level rise and coastal flooding in the Chesapeake Bay region and the effects on people and the environment.

Maryland is especially vulnerable to the effects of rising seas. The rate of relative sea level rise in the Mid-Atlantic region is higher than the global average. The state’s elevation is relatively low and land subsidence in the Chesapeake region is relatively high.

Chesapeake Quarterly, in partnership with the Bay Journal newspaper, published 15 online articles about this problem on a multimedia webpage that features dramatic photos, video interviews with local residents coping with coastal flooding, and an interactive map viewer showing effects at the local, neighborhood level. A subset of these articles appeared in this print issue of Chesapeake Quarterly. Maryland Sea Grant compiled all of the articles and associated images into a 72-page compilation that is available as a PDF download here.

Books

The blue crab is a significant U.S. commercial and recreational species that ranges from the Mid-Atlantic to the Gulf of Mexico. In Chesapeake Bay, the blue crab has become a regional symbol, as well as the Bay's most profitable seafood product.

Well-known marine biologists Victor Kennedy and the late Eugene Cronin, winner of the Mathias Medal, edited this 800-page volume and assembled scientists who are leaders in their respective fields of blue crab study to provide this first comprehensive overview of the science surrounding the blue crab.

The Blue Crab includes chapters on systematics; anatomy of larval, juvenile, and adult stages; molting and growth; reproduction; diseases and parasites; physiology; ecology of all life history stages; history of blue crab fisheries in the U.S.; and population dynamics.

Underwater grasses, or submerged aquatic vegetation (SAV), play a key role in the ecology of coastal waters, and especially in the Chesapeake Bay. These grasses help keep waters clear and provide habitat for blue crabs and fish, and food for waterfowl. Over the past several decades, clouded waters have blocked sunlight and smothered many SAV beds.

Efforts are currently underway to help map, study, and reestablish SAV in the Chesapeake and other coastal waters. To help citizen volunteers, students, and others interested in learning more about these plants, we produced this guide to underwater grasses in collaboration with NOAA’s Chesapeake Bay Office, the Alliance for the Chesapeake Bay, and the Maryland Department of Natural Resources.

Documentary Films

The Chesapeake was once home to the richest oyster grounds in the world. The native oyster, Crassostrea virginica, built massive reefs and filtered vast reaches of the Bay, removing algae and sediment. Then, the reefs became a mere shadow in the Bay’s past.

This film details both the poignant destruction of a fabled fishery and the prolonged scientific inquiry into the origins of a killer parasite. It peers toward a future where the Bay's oyster grounds may shrink to low-salinity areas where disease does not dominate, questioning if we can save both the oyster reefs and the oystermen.

The film was broadcast on Maryland Public Television annually from 2011 to 2014 as part of their Chesapeake Bay Week programming. The film has been shown at the RVA Environmental Film Festival in Richmond, the Annapolis Green Film Festival, and the DC Environmental Film Festival.

When watermen found wounded fish along a lonely river in Maryland, they kicked off a scientific debate and an environmental crisis focused on a mysterious microbe that may—or may not—cause sick fish and sick people.

The Pfiesteria Files follows all the players in this crisis—watermen and farmers, doctors and scientists and state officials—as well as the journalists who reported the story to an anxious public. It investigates the origins of the "Pfiesteria hysteria" that gripped much of the mid-Atlantic during the September fish kill season of 1997, and examines the dangers of toxic blooms in coastal waters around the country.

This film has won several awards, including a local Emmy for long-form documentaries and a World Gold Medal for the New York International Film and Television Festival.

Program Announcements

Maryland Sea Grant seeks to hire a Science Writer / Editor to explain and share findings from scientists, extension agents, and other sources to help advance public understanding and management of Maryland's natural resources. More details.

Maryland Sea Grant has program development funds for start-up efforts or strategic support for emerging areas of research. Apply here.

News and Blogs

Video Gallery

A native of New England, Walter Boynton began his science career as a summertime assistant at the Chesapeake Biological Laboratory in Solomons, Maryland. Over the next 40+ years he became a leading marine researcher and advocate for science-based approaches to restoring the Chesapeake Bay.

Featured Research Project

We have developed a technology to efficiently produce infertile fish by disrupting primordial germ cell development in fish embryos. The technology uses a bath immersion to administer a Morpholino oligomer (MO) against Deadend (Dnd), an essential protein for early germ cell development in fish. This approach has been successfully used in the zebrafish, trout and salmon. The goal of this proposal is to examine the feasibility of applying this technology to sablefish.